Scheringa puts the cat among the pigeons

Tuesday 13 January 2009

For a few years the New Year's receptions of AZ Alkmaar were quiet.

The most important AZ-sounds came from Louis van Gaal throughout the season.

But when chairman Dirk Scheringa stepped up to the microphone on Monday he put the cat among the pigeons wit some of his remarks.

Scheringa said that the KNVB would be wise to no longer select their referees based on age, but to let quality be the standard.

It sounded like an emergency call about the level of refereeing in the Eredivisie, as Scheringa wasn't speaking on his own personal behalf, but on behalf of the team of AZ.

"Age should not be an issue," the chairman said.

"A referee may be 60 years old, we don't care. As long as he is in top shape and delivers a quality job."

Scheringa also broke a lance for the introduction of electronic aids and for 'real playing time' in football, so that the audience get more for their money.

"Now the crowds are annoyed by delaying the play, lingering with signs and substitutions. It can all be done a lot quicker".

His third remark in the packed Kees Kist-lounge, where everyone smelling a league title had gathered was a serious change of the rules.

Scheringa and AZ would like to abolish the offside rule as soon as possible.

Some thought the bubbles had gone to the chairman's head, but Dirk Scheringa dead-serious when he talked about one of the biggest nuisances in football.

"Ten centimeters onside or offside. In the stadium you think the referee got it right but then at home in the evening you see the TV-images and conclude that they were wrong again. We really should get rid of that."

The owner and most powerful man at AZ does not intend to be the next Jorien van den Herik, the former Feyenoord chairman who traditionally used the club's New Year gathering to stir up the football world with some outrageous new plan.

And he does not feel the need to force his own vision upon football.

Scheringa feels most at home within the family atmosphere of AZ where he hopes Louis van Gaal can lead them to the championship.

After a few years of explosive growth in the new stadium it turned out that a first attempt at the title did not bring the hoped for success.

Then came the dramatic last season.

Now, with a smaller budget, hardly any spectacular signings and a young squad who's only mission it is to end within the first five, AZ feel they are where they should be.

A league title should be won on the back of the provincial power and the charms of a small club, not just with the millions of the rich banker Scheringa is.

The man agrees: "When a supporter arrives at the club he is greeted by a traffic controller who says 'good evening, welcome at the club, you can park your car over there.' AZ are about team building. That means we do things together. There are 220 people on our paylist and there are some 300 volunteers, a total of some 500 people. They get steered by a group of 5: Toon Gerbrands, Louis van Gaal, Marcel Brands, René Neelissen (financial director) and I. It works remarkably well. Short lines, very decisive."

Within that top 5 the voice of Louis van Gaal carries a little more weight than the others. When the coach says he wants to keep his squad together during the transfer window, Scheringa and Brands (as Director of Football) park themselves in front of the gate.

When Brands says he does not yet want to give his son Kevin a contract Van Gaal says he should.

And when all clubs in the Eredivisie spread out over southern Europe, the AZ coach keeps his players close to home.

Simply train in the polder at five degrees below zero; no one has ever died from that.

And the chairman still wears his goat wool socks.

AZ will always be AZ.